Digital Economy Policy in Thailand: Institutional Analysis on Intergovernmental Relations of the Governmental Agencies

Abstract

This article aims to analyze Thailand’s digital economy policy, focusing on proposing an explanation about the intergovernmental relations of the agencies responsible for driving the digital economy policy and implementation. The results showed that the digital economy policy scheme assigned new roles and responsibilities to those involved in the processes. They have become “the critical factor” to influence the existing policy scheme at macro level. Therefore, the numbers of agencies are related to the diversity of the agencies’ assigned roles represented dynamics within the public sector. The principal objective of the institutional design for effective policymaking and the processes is to attract more agencies to collaborate in the governance system by using a “result oriented” approach. However, the challenging factor is that lacking appropriate coordination amongst those agencies would significantly affect an effective policy transfer at different levels: national level, collective choice level, and operational level, especially when it comes to consideration about the relationships of the agencies at the operational level of the central government, the deregulated (and privatized) state-agencies, and the public organizations.